Adobe Photoshop Elements 8: Maximum Performance

Project 6

High Dynamic Range

Contrary to popular opinion, what you see is not always what you get. You may be able to see the detail in those dark shadows and bright highlights when the sun is shining – but can your image sensor? contrast in a scene is often a photographer’s worst enemy. It is a sneak thief that steals away the detail in the highlights or shadows (sometimes both). Wedding photographers will deal with the problem of contrast by using fill flash to lower the subject contrast; commercial photographers diffuse their own light source or use additional fill lighting and check for missing detail using the histogram. Landscape photographers, however, have drawn the short straw when it comes to solving the contrast problem. For the landscape ...